Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-788cddb947-r7bls Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-10-08T18:05:17.059Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Headgear as a Paralinguistic Signifier in King Lear

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2007

Peter Holland
Affiliation:
Shakespeare Institute, University of Birmingham
Get access

Summary

Ophelia’s identification of Hamlet as mad because when he visited her in her chamber he did not wear a hat suggests strongly that in the original performances he had one on his head at least for his opening scenes. His urgings to Osric to put his own hat to its proper use in Act 5 indicate that he was wearing it again by the play’s last act. Our current neglect of headgear with its multiple functions as what the specialists in body language like to call a paralinguistic signifier has lost us several potent features not only of the original staging of Hamlet but of King Lear with its panoply of regal and ducal crowns and their varying status, and Lear’s own progressive shedding of all his headgear. That loss is accompanied by an even bigger one: access to what actually happened in the original performances of the two divergent versions of its conclusion. The evidence about the wearing and not-wearing of headgear in the first performances of King Lear repays careful study. We have regrettably little evidence about what the original players of Lear might have worn, but the indications about headgear in the text strongly suggest that the author expected it to be used significantly. The play’s choice to open the 1606 Christmas entertainments at Court argues, if nothing else, that the players took considerable care over the correctness of their royal and courtly regalia.

Type
Chapter
Information
Shakespeare Survey
An Annual Survey of Shakespeare Studies and Production
, pp. 43 - 52
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2002

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×